Sweetheart, What Have I Done To Us?
by jarran
Summary: Liz loses her cool at Red and has to face a hard truth...


**I'm a bit late from watching the latest episodes of the Blacklist. I wrote this as I'm on a bit of a downer at the moment for some reason, maybe it's what Red and Liz do to me? Anyway, hope you enjoy this.**

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_**Sweetheart, What Have I Done To Us?**_

Liz was shocked by how much rage a man could make her quietly feel.

Red had lured her into a metal psych ward to talk to an unstable patient about the curability of the Cullen Virus, and she was dreading having to fly back with him on his jet. If she had it her way, she would never have to step foot near him ever again. He had betrayed her- in a big way. In an unforgivable way. And now, here she was, being forced to endure him all over again.

She watched Red talking in a rather dramatic way for a few minutes, playing along with the man who was probably some lunatic who hadn't the faintest idea what he was talking about. And then she had well and truly had enough. She was more than certain that this was Reddington's grand scheme all along, just to get her alone and coerce her into forgiving him. Well, over her dead body.

She stood up from the folded chair she was sitting in and didn't bother to excuse herself, heading out the ward into the corridor hastily. She knew Reddington was on her tail when she heard the door open and then his footsteps.

"Where are you going, Lizzie?"

Blowing out an exasperated sigh, she turned to face him. His eyes bore into hers and he had the gall to look confused. "You tricked me into coming here, didn't you?" Her voice was too loud, it echoed around the corridor, so she lowered it carefully, "You're trying to force me into forgiving you after everything you've done. But what you clearly don't understand, is that all of it... is unforgivable."

She watched as Red's jaw slackened then tightened at her accusation. "No, I'm here because the man inside that room-"

"-The man is a lunatic! He's in a mental ward! He has no idea what he is talking about! Do you really see me as such a fool? I know exactly what you're doing and, trust me, it's not going to work!" Liz struggled to keep her feelings under control, and her eyes burned. "You took someone I loved away from me, and for that, forgiveness isn't going to come easily from me, you monstrous son of a bitch!"

As she spun around on the spot and turned her back on him, she heard the movement before she felt his hand come in contact with her lower back. After everything he had done, she felt he no longer had the right to touch her, in any capacity, and it enraged her even more. Gritting her teeth and without thinking, she whirled around to face him and before she knew it her palm was connecting with the side of his face. She heard the resounding slap echo along the corridor and instead of feeling a morsel of satisfaction, her body sagged in regret.

She had put enough force into the slap that her palm and fingers ached, and she saw the way his cheek tinged a light red from the sudden, impulsive blow. Red's mouth was parted in shock before he recollected himself in blinking several times, then closed it back up again.

"When are you going to get the message?" she seethed, her voice quivering furiously. "Why are you just standing there? Why don't you ever show me anything, like a reaction? Or do I have to slap you again to push you hard enough?"

Spurred on again by his silence, she raised her other hand in the air, ready to give it another shot. But he acted far more quickly than she thought possible and grabbed tight hold of her wrist, keeping it where it was and preventing it from moving. "Lizzie, you can hit me all you want, whenever you want. It is never going to take back the fact that I did what I did to Sam."

She met his eyes and gnawed her teeth together, her entire body trembling from head to toe. His eyes were wet and pleading for some level of understanding from her, something he probably knew he would never come to get.

"I have worked with you for months after my father died," she hissed, "And you went on as if nothing happened, and yet, you were the very reason he's dead!"

"No."

"Yes, you were! You pretended all along that you were ignorant, and, for that, forgiveness is beyond what you deserve from me! You looked me right in the face and pretended as if you knew nothing!"

She jerked her arm to get free, only he wasn't having any of that.

"If you were in that room, you would understand completely where I am coming from, Lizzie. The man wanted some peace and for all the suffering to end. I did only what I could do, in giving him that."

Liz attempted to pull her hand free again, belatedly realizing how powerless she was. His grip only tightened. "Stop trying to justify it!"

"You really need to calm down, Lizzie, before they lock us in the mental ward as well."

"Good," she squeezed out between her teeth, "Let them! You deserve to be in here for what you've done! Now, let me go and stay the hell away from me!"

"Not until you calm down, Lizzie. Breathe. In and out."

"Go to hell!"

His grasp on her hand tightened to the point of pain and she cried out as he took a step closer towards her in the corridor, his face inches away from hers and an irritation in his expression that she hadn't seen from him before. Doing the only thing she could do, she used her free hand to her advantage in slapping him again, this time on the shoulder, but he grabbed that one by the wrist also and held her arms firmly in the air, preventing her from moving or lashing out any longer. Liz didn't know how longer she could push him, how longer she could keep this up for, before he lost it completely. She knew what he was capable of when being pushed hard enough to breaking point, and she knew she probably ought to have been afraid for her safety, but her anger and the sense of hurt she felt outweighed anything else.

When he spoke again, his words were low and full of warning. "Calm down. Inflicting pain on me is only going to hurt you in the long run."

"Oh, is that a threat?"

When Liz sensed his grip faltering on her wrists, she gave out a heavy pull and managed to fling them free. She flung herself from him, backing away, until her elbow collided with the wall behind her. His eyes remained on hers, his expression a blank slate, while her chest heaved and her wrists ached.

"Do you have any idea what you've done to me?" she demanded, and her voice broke. "You've destroyed everything. In doing that to my father, you've done that to me! I needed you as someone I could trust, especially after all this business with Tom... and you've destroyed it completely time and time again by showing me how bad you are!"

When he finally dared to speak, the words were soft and full of sincerity. "I'm sorry."

Her head reeled as she stepped closer to him, "What?"

Red's voice rose an octave higher, "I said that I'm sorry, Lizzie, as... of small significance that word might come to you."

"You say that you care about me, and yet what you've done shows me a lack of it when you take someone I loved and cared the most about away from me! You've slaughtered me!"

His eyes moved slowly across her face as he nodded once to acknowledge that painful truth. "If I have slaughtered you, then I have slaughtered myself, Lizzie. Causing you pain and hurting you this way was never intentional. I did what I believed I had to do best, in easing a man's suffering and letting him die with some dignity. I did what I personally believed was right, for Sam. But don't think for even one multitude of a second that I don't regret what I had to do for that man, because I do, constantly... every hour of the day and every time I look at you."

Liz closed her eyes briefly at his words, feeling the tears streaking down her cheeks. She felt suddenly rained on with various conflicting emotions. On one hand, she wanted to accept his words as truth and try to believe them, yet believing them hurt too much. The wound was far too deep.

As she reopened her eyes to focus on him through the blurriness of them, she watched as the side muscle of his mouth twitched.

"I can't forgive you," she said softly, all the weight settling heavily on those words as she spoke them. "This is one line that you've crossed that can never be repaired. I can't forgive you, so please, stop trying for me. You can't win it from me, not ever."

"I know that, Lizzie. But it's what I want for the most, above everything else."

She nodded at him and closed her eyes again, before turning and walking slowly down the corridor, not looking back at him once.


End file.
